1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to dietary devices for medical treatment of obesity.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Those who have a problem with obesity have few options available to them with respect to a solution. The typical approach is to rely on the person's willpower to stick to a particular diet or to use diet pills to try and reduce the desire for food. These may be effective measures, depending upon the individual, but if the person is either physically or mentally unable to control his weight gain, he may be subject to more drastic measures, such as surgical reduction of the size of the stomach or bypassing much of the small intestines. Unfortunately, such measures have resulted in death to the patient in a substantial number of cases. Even if death is not the result, the operation is often permanent and the patient is still subjected to the after-effects once the problem with obesity is corrected. One approach to correcting obesity involves reducing the desire for food. This can be accomplished by partially filling the stomach so as to produce the sensation of being "filled-up." One way of accomplishing this is to place an inflatable, elastomeric bag in the stomach and inflate the bag with fluid.
Inflatable bag and tube combination devices are known in the field of medicine and have experienced use by the medical profession in the treatment of gastric disorders such as stomach ulcers and hemorrhages in the upper gastrointestinal tract. Cook, U.S. Pat. No. 3,227,154 discloses a device in which the bag must be fully inflated so that its impressionable-settable outer surface can make impressions in the walls of cavities which have restricted outlets. Another use of inflatable bag and tube combination devices as disclosed by Gawura, U.S. Pat. No. 3,768,484 and Seaman, U.S. Pat. No. 3,174,481, is to transfer and retain a cooling solution at a particular internal location. The bag acts merely as a container for this solution and the characteristic of being inflatable allows a single bag to be used with a wide range of cavity sizes. These prior art references all disclose tubes with a plurality of passageways and a liquid to inflate the bag.
In all of these situations, the use of the inflatable bag is of a short duration; once the diagnosis or treatment has been performed, the bag is removed from the human being's body. These types of applications do not require, nor do they benefit, from the bag remaining within the human being.